The pronunciation of "Xian" when referring to alkali is typically [zhen]. This pronunciation is influenced by the way the word is used in English, where "alkali" is pronounced with a soft "g" sound. The Chinese character "碱" (jiǎn) is often used to represent alkali in English, but the pronunciation is adapted to English phonetics. Data from the American English Pronunciation Dictionary supports this, indicating that the word "alkali" is pronounced with a soft "g" sound, which corresponds to the [zhen] pronunciation.